A Question of Priorities
by Gary Merchant
Summary: The Brigadier faces a stark choice.


A QUESTION OF PRIORITIES  
  
EXPLANATORY NOTE: The idea for this came after writing A Quiet Life. I found I wanted to delve a bit more into the Brig's private life and expand a bit more on his relationship with Doris before their marriage.  
  
The park was full of people, but to the couple walking along the gravel path it was as though they were the only ones there. Two people, both very much in love. But even on a perfect day such as this, she knew when something wasn't as it should be. "Alistair?"  
  
"Hmm." He had been lost in thought. "Sorry, Doris. What were you saying?"  
  
She sighed. "Nothing. It's just, well you seem a bit distant these days."  
  
He offered an apologetic smile. "Things on my mind lately."  
  
"Can I help? A trouble shared...?" Doris offered.  
  
"No," he replied, after a moment. "Look, I'm not very good company at the moment, I know. Give me a few days and I'll have it all sorted."  
  
She was about to ask 'all what sorted?' but thought better of it. "Alright. Will I see you tonight?"  
  
"I hope so," was all Alistair could reply. But Doris smiled, allaying some of his concerns. She knew he couldn't talk about his work, and that simple fact had made her realise early on in their relationship that Alistair was definitely not a nine to five man.  
  
"Bye then." She kissed him on the cheek, gave him a cherry wave, as she set off through the park towards the exit, and onto her own day job. Alistair turned in the opposite direction, and headed back to UNIT HQ.  
  
More recently, Alistair had felt more comfortable about seeing Doris on a regular basis. They had met while he was still married, though nothing improper had ever developed. But when her own marriage ended, Alistair came to feel protective towards her. After his divorce from Fiona came through, he had felt at a loss, and so it was Doris who comforted him. After a time they had come to realise that they were right for each other.  
  
And for Alistair, that's where the problems had started.  
  
He was torn between his love for Doris and his duty to his country. He was determined that he would somehow resolve the two. But the solution, which seemed fine in theory, might not be so easy to carry out in practice.  
  
*****  
  
A knock sounded at his office door. "Come."  
  
Corporal Bell entered with a sheaf of papers. "The reports you wanted on the Zygon Gambit, sir."  
  
"Ah, good." He stared at the papers without really looking at them. "Anything else to report?"  
  
"No, sir. All quiet." She paused, looking at her commanding officer. "Are you alright, sir?"  
  
"Mmm?" Lethbridge Stewart looked up. "Sorry, miles away. Carry on, Corporal."  
  
"Sir." She turned to leave.  
  
As she reached the door he called her back. "Carol?"  
  
It was rare for the Brigadier to address her by her first name. "Is there something, sir?"  
  
"Close the door, please. Sit down." She did so. "Corporal... Carol, I need some advice."  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Of a personal nature." Carol Bell was surprised at this request. The Brigadier normally kept his private life private. He noted her quizzical expression and attempted to explain. "It's not something I could talk to Yates or Benton about, and since the Doctor disappeared off to heaven knows where with Miss Smith... well, there's no one else I can talk to."  
  
"Sir, I'm not sure what help I can offer, without knowing the cause," Bell pointed out.  
  
"Oh, didn't I say?" Lethbridge Stewart tended to do one of two things when it came to discussing his personal life; either say very little, or skirt around the issue. He coughed, slightly embarrassed. "Well... it's Doris!"  
  
"Doris?" Bell thought for a moment. "Oh yes, her name has come up once or twice."  
  
"Quite." The Brigadier's mind went back to the Doctor's ESP experiments with Professor Clegg – he had handed over a watch that Clegg identified as being a present from Doris. "Well, there's a problem... ah, no that's not what I meant. Perhaps a dilemma? No..."  
  
"Sir!" Carol Bell silenced him in a moment. "Just come out with it!"  
  
Lethbridge Stewart regarded Bell in a new light. "Corporal, did you just raise your voice to a superior officer?"  
  
"Yes sir," she replied.  
  
"I thought as much." They stared at each other in silence, the Brigadier breaking the deadlock with a wry smile. "Just come out with it, you say?"  
  
Bell returned the smile. "Please."  
  
"Well, it's like this." The smile was replaced by a troubled frown. "Doris and I have been seeing a lot of each other and, not to put too fine a point on it, she's become very special to me. The thing is, Carol, I don't want to lose her." He sighed heavily. "My wife left me because she didn't know from one day to the next when I'd be home, or if I'd be coming home at all. Perhaps if she'd known something of what we do here... and that's my dilemma. I could lose Doris in exactly the same way; she could walk out on me one day without any warning, and it would be my fault." He fell silent, waiting for some comment from Carol Bell. "Look, I'm sorry to be burdening you with this, but... "  
  
"But you needed someone to talk to," she finished for him. "Sir, I don't think there's anything I can say one way or the other. It sounds to me as though you've reached a decision."  
  
"Of sorts, yes," he admitted.  
  
"Then all I can say is, follow it through."  
  
The Brigadier thought for a moment. "Yes, you're right of course." He looked down at the reports, as though seeing them for the first time. "Well, better get on. These reports won't sign themselves."  
  
Bell took this as her cue to leave. As she reached the door, Lethbridge Stewart called her back. "Carol?"  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Thanks for listening." She smiled and walked out, closing the door behind her. The Brigadier began to sift through the reports, then paused. "Follow it through," he considered. "If only it were that easy."  
  
*****  
  
"Alistair, you have got to be joking!" Sir John Sudbury exclaimed.  
  
"I've never been more serious in my life." Lethbridge Stewart's tone was resolute. "After all, what else can I do?"  
  
The two friends were at Sir John Sudbury's club. Lethbridge Stewart had decided to forgo his uniform in favour of a dark blazer and slacks. The less attention he drew to himself, the better.  
  
Sir John continued to protest. "But if you go through with this, you risk losing everything you've worked for."  
  
"I know that," the Brigadier insisted. "What I need to know is, is there a precedent for this sort of thing? Anything I can refer back to?"  
  
Sir John mulled the question over in his mind. "I'm not sure," he answered. "Give me a day or two and I'll know for certain. In the meantime," he added, "I think it's time for a spot of lunch. I hear the lamb is particularly good today."  
  
"Is that in a sacrificial sense?" Lethbridge Stewart wondered.  
  
"Good Lord, I hope not!" Sir John chuckled.  
  
*****  
  
A couple of days later, and Alistair met Doris again in the local park. As soon as she saw him she noticed how tense he seemed. They engaged in small talk for a good twenty minutes, but still his general mood appeared no better. "Alistair, what's wrong?" she finally asked.  
  
"Why should there be anything wrong?" he countered.  
  
"Because I've known you long enough to read the signs; you're not as relaxed as usual, evading direct questions and being generally standoffish."  
  
Alistair smiled. "Is that all? I shall have to be more careful next time."  
  
Finally Doris had had enough. "Alistair, don't you dare play those minds games with me! Why, for once in your life, can't you say what you feel?"  
  
Her outburst had shocked him. "Doris, I... I'm sorry."  
  
"Sorry? Oh, how many times have I heard that before? You're always sorry. But you never say what you're sorry about!" Doris was in tears, now. "I know nothing about what you do – you either can't or won't tell me. But I love you, Alistair, though God knows why."  
  
Shaken, Alistair pulled out a handkerchief and passed it to her. "Thanks," she sobbed. "Sorry."  
  
"I'm sorry too. Really." In those last few moments his decision was made. "Will you let me make it up to you?"  
  
"How?"  
  
"By asking you to make an honest man of me."  
  
Wiping away the last of her tears, for a moment Doris wasn't sure if she'd heard correctly. "What?"  
  
Alistair took her hands in his, and gazed into her eyes. "Doris, will you marry me?"  
  
For a moment she said nothing. Then she answered, but the reply came in a whisper that he could barely hear. "Doris?"  
  
"Yes," she repeated. "Yes, yes, yes!" She reached up and hugged him, and he spun her around in his arms, laughing. In that split second, nothing else mattered. She had said yes, and it was all Alistair could do to hold back his own tears.  
  
Tears of joy.  
  
*****  
  
"So, where are we going?"  
  
Alistair had persuaded – no, insisted – that Doris skip the rest of her working day and join him for what seemed to be a mystery tour. They had long since left the park and were now heading toward an officious type building. Doris looked up at her fiancé. "Alistair, what's going on?"  
  
He smiled, but there was a serious edge to his voice. "Doris, this is where I work."  
  
"Here? But..."  
  
"Strictly speaking, you shouldn't really be here," he confided, "but I managed to pull a few strings."  
  
From the outside it appeared to be just an old manor house, but as they went inside, Doris noted that the usual plush furnishings associated with such a place had been removed, and replaced with more contemporary fixtures and fittings.  
  
Alistair led her toward the reception desk, where the desk sergeant handed over a security pass. "You'll need this," he explained, affixing it to her lapel.  
  
"Thank you, err..."  
  
"Benton, ma'am." He offered a helpful smile.  
  
Lethbridge Stewart coughed. "Thank you, Benton." He proceeded to guide Doris through a maze of corridors, until eventually the two of them arrived outside his own office.  
  
Corporal Bell looked up from her desk as they approached. "A good lunch, sir?"  
  
"Most pleasant, thank you Corporal." He joined Doris as she read the legend on the frosted glass:-  
  
Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart UNIT  
  
He opened the door, indicating for her to enter. She paused, uncertain of what she was getting herself into. But Alistair's encouraging smile dispelled most of her concerns. "Excuse the mess, won't you Doris," he apologised, "only we don't get many visitors."  
  
*****  
  
Alistair and Doris laughed at the memory of that day, all those years ago. "What you should have said Alistair, was that you didn't often get any human visitors."  
  
A fresh peal of laughter rose up at that remark. Eventually their mirth subsided, as they both sank back into the sofa, watching the fire in the hearth creating pictures in the flames. "Oh, Doris," Alistair remembered. "What a day that was."  
  
"And I hadn't even met the Doctor then."  
  
"Probably just as well," he observed dryly. "If you had, I've no doubt he would have been tempted to drag you halfway across the galaxy in that TARDIS of his."  
  
"You were running a bit of a risk though, weren't you?" she gently chided him. "Allowing a civilian onto UNIT property?"  
  
"Well, thanks to Sir John I did manage to pull some strings. And it helped that your father was someone of note in the Ministry. Even so," he added, "I would have still risked everything."  
  
Doris looked at him, a serious look on her face. "You really mean that."  
  
"I meant it then, and I would do it again."  
  
"But why, when your career..."  
  
"Doris." Alistair silenced her protests. "When you became part of my life after my divorce, I realised that you were the one person who mattered to me. All that I had experienced in my time at UNIT suddenly meant nothing." He took a sip of malt whisky. "I suppose, when it came down to it, it was a question of priorities." He smiled at her. "Sorry, I'm rambling again."  
  
She snuggled up beside him. "You ramble as much as you like, Alistair. I don't mind a bit." They chinked glasses and watched the firelight. A happy couple without a care in the world. "Happy Anniversary, darling." "Happy Anniversary, Doris." 


End file.
